The “tough, competent manager” and, at the same time, Moscow mayoral candidate S. S. Sobyanin, for some reason, had absolutely no desire to answer my questions about how hundreds of millions of rubles were stolen during the laying of “Sobyanin paving tiles”.
He stays silent and only arranges paid-for segments on state TV channels about what a wonderful job he does running the city.
That is sad.
Still, I very much want to ask candidate Sobyanin one more question. About urban beautification. Using the example of the “greening of Tverskaya Street.” It is a scandalous subject, and many people have written about it.
Here is an absolutely excellent investigative report by Pavel Lobkov on TV Rain.
And here is a detailed photo report on this “greening”, which cost an utterly astronomical amount of money.
As Pavel Lobkov calculated, it came to 8 million rubles per single shrub.
All experts agree that this “greening” should have cost at least ten times less.
I asked the guys from RosPil (an anti-corruption project focused on public procurement) to look into how Sobyanin managed to “green away” so much taxpayer money. Here is what ipasserby dug up, and many thanks to him for it.
1.
On 11 February 2013, the Moscow City Department for Competition Policy announced a procurement for the greening of Tverskaya Street - http://zakupki.gov.ru/pgz/public/action/orders/info/common_info/show?notificationId=5474607
According to the auction documentation, the total value of the work was to exceed 269,513,520 rubles. For that money, the winner was supposed to plant 68 trees and 690 shrubs, and also install 631 small architectural elements. The deadline for completing the work was 20 December 2013.
The method of greening and its senselessly high cost immediately caused a scandal. The landscaping could not possibly have cost such an enormous sum, even taking into account innovative methods of greening (that is, the most expensive ones).
The practical absurdity of planting greenery in special marble containers and then replanting it every six months obviously raises questions. Lobkov’s report above covers this in detail. The marble tubs freeze through completely, so the trees and shrubs will simply have to be moved back and forth every six months.
2.
The scandal led to the cancellation of the procurement on 14 February 2013 by order No. 12-25-73/13, dated 14 February 2013, issued by S. E. Kharitonov, director of the Moscow state public institution “Directorate of the Department of Nature Management and Environmental Protection.”
The stated justification was: “In accordance with the 2013 Expenditure Register of the Department of Nature Management and Environmental Protection, Department Order No. 263 of 28 June 2012 ‘On Approval of the Regulations for Procurement Placement by the Department and Its Subordinate Institutions,’ Department Order No. 34 of 1 February 2013 ‘On the Composition of the Unified Commission for the Department’s Procurement Placement,’ and Moscow Government Resolution No. 67-PP of 24 February 2012 ‘On the Procurement System of the City of Moscow.’ The document is available at - http://zakupki.gov.ru/pgz/public/action/orders/info/order_document_list_info/show?notificationId=5474607
3.
However, the cancellation of the tender was merely a diversionary maneuver to stop the uproar.
Our “tough, competent manager” Sobyanin was so eager to hand this grossly overpriced contract to a particular contractor that on 6 March 2013 he personally signed Moscow Government Resolution No. 128-PP, “On carrying out greening work on Tverskaya Street using experimental landscaping methods and urban improvement elements, and on granting a subsidy to the State Unitary Enterprise ‘Center for the Performance of Work and Provision of Environmental Services’ to reimburse costs associated with carrying out said work.”
The document is available at http://docs.pravo.ru/document/view/32596204/
Justification: In accordance with Article 12 of Moscow City Law No. 59 of 21 November 2012, “On the Budget of the City of Moscow for 2013 and the Planning Period of 2014 and 2015,” and for the purpose of improving the city’s environmental condition.
To carry out this scheme, corresponding amendments were specifically made to Moscow’s budget law.
True, those amendments were made a month after Sobyanin issued the order—on 10 April 2013.
The amendments were introduced by Moscow City Law No. 15 of 10 April 2013, “On Amendments to the Moscow City Budget Law for 2013,” which entered into force on the date of its official publication—22 April 2013.
Clause 1 of Sobyanin’s resolution states that the work is to be carried out from 10 March 2013 to 31 December 2017, from Manezhnaya Square to Pushkin Square, using experimental landscaping methods and urban improvement elements. There is no further technical specification whatsoever.
The completion date is given as 2017 (whereas the original posted procurement set it at 20 December 2013). This deadline is not justified in any way.
Clause 2: grant the State Unitary Enterprise “Center for the Performance of Work and Provision of Environmental Services” 219,253,200 rubles from budget appropriations provided for by Moscow City Law No. 59 of 21 November 2012, “On the Budget of the City of Moscow for 2013 and the Planning Period of 2014 and 2015”—I remind you that the amendments to the budget law had not yet been adopted and had not yet entered into force.
The amount of the subsidy is not justified by anything.
In other words, for those who did not quite grasp the point of the scheme: Sobyanin personally, bypassing the law, canceled the required competitive procedures, assigned the “greening” to a specific outfit, and gave it budget money for the job.
As a result of Sobyanin’s scheme, the greening of Tverskaya now requires neither a technical specification, nor competitive procedures under Federal Law No. 94-FZ, nor any price justification—just Sobyanin’s order, and that’s it.
What exactly are these experimental landscaping methods? Why exactly 219 million rubles in costs? It is unclear.
By the way, the actual implementation of the greening is absolutely identical to the technical section of the canceled auction documentation - http://zakupki.gov.ru/pgz/public/action/orders/info/order_document_list_info/show?notificationId=5474607
Incidentally, in violation of 94-FZ, the auction documentation did not include design and cost-estimate documents. This is the most common way of restricting competition in tenders: the project documentation is given only to the “right” participant—the future winner—while everyone else cannot prepare well-founded bids because, without the project, they do not have a precise understanding of the scope of work.
Let’s look at the outfit that got this “sweet contract.” So what is this state unitary enterprise? It does not even have its own website. There is only a page with documents on the official site - http://zakupki.gov.ru/223/ppa/public/organization/organization.html?agencyId=578
Could Sobyanin “hand” the contract to the state unitary enterprise without a tender, simply because it is a state-owned enterprise?
Under clauses 1.3, 1.5, and 1.6 of its charter, the enterprise is a commercial legal entity and is not liable for Moscow’s obligations, just as Moscow is not liable for its obligations. Under clause 4.1 of the enterprise’s charter, it conducts relations with state bodies on the basis of commercial agreements, arrangements, and contracts.
The answer: no, he could not.
4.
If you think that after this little trick by Sobyanin, the Moscow State Unitary Enterprise “Center for the Performance of Work and Provision of Environmental Services” rushed to carry out the greening of Tverskaya Street itself, you are very much mistaken.
Despite the fact that the enterprise could and should have carried out the work itself, it followed the classic scheme: it subcontracted the work out.
On 19 March 2013, the enterprise posted a procurement for this work under 223-FZ, in the form of an open request for proposals. http://zakupki.gov.ru/223/purchase/public/purchase/info/common-info.html?purchaseId=211571&&purchaseMethodType=is# The starting price was 289,686,260 rubles—that is, 70 million rubles more than the subsidy allocated to it. In other words, they added some “of their own” as well.
According to the technical specification http://zakupki.gov.ru/223/purchase/public/purchase/info/documents.html?purchaseId=211571&&purchaseMethodType=is, the job was to landscape 570 above-ground containers (instead of 631 in the canceled procurement), 60 for trees, 138 and 51 for something else (custom design), plus 105 trash bins and 76 benches. In general, the assignment practically matches the greening project - http://www.deco.mos.ru/deco/ru/n_267/o_1819
The winner was OJSC “MISK,” Tax ID 7709857542, Registration Code 770901001, Open Joint-Stock Company “Moscow Engineering and Construction Company,” with a price of 279,547,240 rubles.
The completion period was 20 days. So why not until 2017, as stated in Sobyanin’s order?
It is completely unclear who is supposed to haul the trees away every six months if the contract term is only 20 days. And why Sobyanin specified 2017 in his order.
After that, on 29 March 2013, the enterprise posted another procurement for work to prepare planting sites for freestanding trees as part of the experimental greening project for Tverskaya Street in Moscow, from Manezhnaya Square to Pushkin Square. http://zakupki.gov.ru/223/purchase/public/purchase/info/common-info.html?purchaseId=236814&&purchaseMethodType=is. Apparently, they had simply forgotten about this at first. The starting contract price was 2,046,010.21 rubles. The participants were the same. The winner was the same. The contract price was 1,974,399.6 rubles.
Sobyanin’s little scheme now takes on its final form.
To hand the contract to “the right people” and avoid a scandal, it is passed through a city-owned state unitary enterprise.
The owner of the enterprise is Moscow. Moscow gave the enterprise a subsidy from the budget. The enterprise passed the money to OJSC “MISK.” OJSC “MISK” made a very decent profit.
Thus, in total, Moscow handed 281,521,639.6 rubles to OJSC “MISK.”
And this is what we got:
Where each “composition” of three planters and a bench costs more than 3 million rubles. And on top of that, twice a year, for a separate fee, the plants will be dug in and dug out again.
Let us take a closer look at the “lucky winner” in the database: Open Joint-Stock Company “Moscow Engineering and Construction Company” Converted from LLC “Moscow Engineering and Construction Company” Date of establishment: 16 July 2010. It has won state contracts worth 17.3 billion rubles. The company clearly has very serious administrative backing. There is a full list of the contracts it has won. All of them are in the city of Moscow, from Moscow state customers. The company built roads in Butovo, Kuntsevo, and Kurkino, took part in construction on the MKAD (Moscow Ring Road), and laid paving tiles in Moscow.
Authorized capital: 100,000 rubles. Registered address: 65 Zemlyanoy Val, Building 2, Moscow 109004. Established legal entities: LLC “B.B.L.” LLC “MISK Beton” LLC “Park-Project” LLC “MISK Service” LLC “MISK Development” There are reportedly around five hundred related legal entities.
The CEO is Farit Rifovich Khaidarov, and the Chairman of the Board is Gennady Moiseyevich Zhivotinsky.
The company website - http://www.mis-k.ru/o_kompanii/rukovodstvo2/
If you start googling the management, you will immediately find this:
“Blogger Andrei Malgin published an investigation accusing Moscow builders of owning lavish real estate in Miami. According to the blogger, Gennady Zhivotinsky, the general director of the ‘Moscow Engineering and Construction Company,’ and his deputy Dmitry Andreenkov were found to own more than $10 million worth of real estate in the United States. Notably, the company was carrying out a city contract for large-scale granite paving of pedestrian zones in central Moscow.” http://realty.rbc.ru/news/13/03/2013/562949986195189.shtml
“Zhivotinsky considers Resin (Vladimir Resin, former head of Moscow’s construction complex) his mentor” - http://www.mospromstroy.com/press/media/?id=224
“As Moscow’s representative, Resin joined the boards of directors of six joint-stock companies, including OJSC ‘Mosinzhstroy’.” http://lenta.ru/lib/14161104/full.htm
Open Joint-Stock Company “Moscow Engineering and Construction Company,” OJSC “Mosinzhstroy,” and OJSC “MISK” are three names for the same company.
OJSC “Mosinzhstroy” was reorganized into OJSC “MISK” in 2010. The liquidation date was 16 July 2010. The company’s registered address did not change.
There is your answer to how the transfer of lucrative contracts is handled in Sobyanin’s mayor’s office.
Old faces. New faces.
But the same old suitcases full of cash solve the same old problems.
Summary:
The Moscow authorities post a procurement for “greening” worth 270 million rubles. An uproar follows, after which they cancel the procurement. Then an order is issued: the greening of Tverskaya Street is assigned to the Moscow city state unitary enterprise “Center for the Performance of Work and Provision of Environmental Services,” with a subsidy of 219 million rubles allocated to this organization. There is no longer any public uproar, because this is no longer a procurement posted on the official website that everyone is used to monitoring. Instead of carrying out the work itself, the enterprise posts two requests for proposals (the very procurement format so beloved by companies buying under 223-FZ), for 290 million and 2 million rubles. The winner of both requests for proposals is OJSC “MISK.” The contract prices are 280 million and 1.9 million rubles. The enterprise incurs losses as a result of carrying out the assignment, because the contract value exceeded the subsidy amount by more than 60 million rubles. Since the enterprise’s property belongs to the city of Moscow, it is the city budget that lost revenue from the enterprise’s operations and suffered the losses. It is obvious that informal ties exist between Moscow City Hall and OJSC “MISK,” allowing OJSC “MISK” to win tenders announced in the city of Moscow. This is indirectly evidenced by the fact that OJSC “MISK,” created just three years ago with authorized capital of 100,000 rubles, wins and participates exclusively in Moscow city tenders and in such a short time has managed to conclude 17 billion rubles’ worth of contracts with the city, not counting contracts with state unitary enterprises and other organizations subordinate to the city. Thus, the actions of officials of the Moscow Government from February 2013 to the present may contain indications of a crime under Part 2 or 3 of Article 285 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation—abuse of official powers causing damage to the interests of society or the state, committed by a person holding a public office of a constituent entity of the Russian Federation. The actions of the director of the state unitary enterprise contain indications of a crime under Article 201 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
Once again, as a Muscovite, a taxpayer, and a candidate for Mayor of Moscow, I ask acting Mayor S. Sobyanin for an explanation of what has been described above.
While I wait, I am sending in these crime reports.
To the Investigative Committee
PS Please help spread this post if, like me, you do not like Tverskaya’s “greening” at 8 million rubles per shrub.
PPS Moscow mayoral candidate Sergei Mitrokhin is asking similar questions.
I would very much like to get some answers.